


anathema

by nimrodcracker



Series: and still I haul my heavy feet [2]
Category: Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Knights of the Old Republic, Star Wars Legends: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Mandalorian Wars, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-02
Updated: 2015-10-02
Packaged: 2018-04-23 20:08:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4890394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nimrodcracker/pseuds/nimrodcracker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Above the skies of Malachor V, blood isn't the only thing that can bleed out of a Jedi.</p>
            </blockquote>





	anathema

**Author's Note:**

> 0 AMW = 0 years After the Mandalorian Wars

_if we don’t make it alive_  
_well it’s a hell of a good day to die_

* * *

3960 BBY // 0 AMW

There was something beautiful about the carnage splayed across the transparisteel viewports; of laserfire and explosions that lit up the black abyss of space, just like the sparkling lights of the Harvest Day celebrations back on Dantooine. 

Was it the tragic frailty of their existence? That all it took was a misplaced shot, a power surge too many, or a manoeuvre executed seconds too slow, before the life was snuffed out of them? 

"It won't be too long, Master Jedi. The Mandies are being pushed back to within Malachor's orbit. One more battlegroup left to herd into position, and this will all be over."

Internally, she sighed. The senselessness of the war was getting to her. 

Her musings interrupted, Venetia favoured the Mon Calamari beside her with a strained smile. "So it seems, Commodore. So it seems." 

Standing in full view of the crew on the bridge of the  _Aegis_ , Venetia appreciated her compatriot's attempts at levity, in light of the hammering the Mandalorians were inflicting on the Republic fleet. Admittedly, the Mandalorians were being pushed back towards the planet, especially after Revan's fleet entered the fray, but each inch they gained was paid for in blood. 

Though Venetia's flagship was a safe distance away from most of the fighting, it wasn't far enough to avoid sensing the deaths of countless beings through the Force; each one of them being pinpricks of pain all over her skin.

Ever since Dxun, the constant needling had solidified into a permanent itch at the bottom of her spine. And ever since Dxun, the faith that convinced her to go to war had been irrevocably shaken. 

Maybe that notion applied to her, and her only.

She didn't have to stretch out her awareness with the Force to confirm something: that Commodore Sylva Genko, along with the rest of her crew aboard the  _Aegis_ , still believed in the justness of the war - perhaps the same could be said of Venetia's fleet. They were tired, they were battered, yes - but all of them wanted to be here to give the Mandies the boot in the face they deserved, whatever the cost. 

They were good soldiers, Venetia thought. Soldiers who marched willingly to their deaths, just because someone told them to.

Venetia wondered if that someone was her.

"Commodore," an ensign spoke up from the communications terminal. His barely-suppressed glee was like a beacon in the sea of weariness in the Force. "Chatter on fleet channels report that Mandalore's been slain by Revan." 

No sooner than she concluded his sentence, cheers broke out all over the bridge, the heady scent of optimism permeating the bridge like Zeltron perfume. 

The Iridonian tech standing beside her however, showed little outward reaction. Only a vindictive smile crossed his face, and his grip on the Shadow weapon's detonator tightened.

The intensity of his gaze spooked her, like how a crazed terentatek would.

"Stay alert, everyone," Venetia addressed the bridge instead, stuffing the Iridonian's expression to the back of her mind. "The Mandies aren't going to roll over just because Mandalore's dead." 

The crew probably knew that already, but it didn't hurt to be a voice of caution. Plus, repeating it gave her some measure of solace. 

A chorus of affirmatives sounded in the bridge, and the equilibrium of before was restored, with the crew resuming their duties with renewed vigour. It was apparent that this Centurion-class Destroyer was filled with competent personnel, so Venetia made a mental note to put in a good word for them to High Command back on Coruscant. 

Commodore Sylva turned to her, the Mon Cal's bulbous eyes illuminated with rare mirth. "Lighten up, Master Jedi," she said in a lower voice. "The crew need something to be happy about."

Rather than reply, Venetia took in the various datafeeds on the console displays around them, forming a mental picture of the raging battle. It didn't look good - for every Republic warship still firing, it faced down three Mandalorian ones.

"Call me dour if you want, Sylva, but something just isn't right about this battle." Venetia burrowed her arms deeper into her chest, shutting her eyes for a moment's respite. "Like there's something hiding in the shadows, waiting to pounce."

Republic soldiers were dying by the minute, but she had her orders - the Mandalorians could  _not_  be allowed to assault the rear of Revan's fleet. 

Venetia tried willing the discomfiting churning in her stomach to  _go away_  - and failed miserably. Something was amiss, but she had no clue towards its source. Indeed, she'd already felt the darkness emanating from Malachor like an ichor on the fringes of her awareness, but she wasn't sure that was it.

And just like that, reports of casualties and destroyed ships came in like a flood. Vindication surged through Venetia's veins as she heard them, and she cast aside the urge to scream  _I-told-you-so's_  at the top of her voice. Jedi weren't supposed to act like petty children. 

"Commodore, the  _Dauntless_  is breaking apart. Captain's relayed orders to jump ship."

"Mandie cruisers broke through our right flank, Ma'am. The  _Bulwark_  is under heavy turbolaser fire, and we've lost contact with the gunships in that sector."

Of course the bucketheads would fight harder. With  _Mand'alor_  dead, the rest of the warriors desired to prove their mettle and vie for the position. The displays didn't lie: the blue blips of Republic ships were blinking out of existence faster than the red ones of the Mandalorians. 

Commodore Sylva barked out orders, ringing loud and clear in the buzz that had overtaken the bridge. Her pinkish complexion had taken on a sickly pallor in those few seconds, and the realisation was there to see: whatever stalemate the Republic forces had ground out before, it no longer existed.

But they had their orders. They had to hold the line - at any cost.

Fear began to seep in the bridge like a fog, but a quick visual survey of the crew arrayed around and below the command platform revealed something to the contrary - the  _Aegis_ ' bridge officers were too battle-hardened to let emotions paralyse them. With sabacc faces and controlled mannerisms borne of habit, only Venetia's Force-enhanced senses would pick up on the suppressed fear.

"General, the Mandalorian fleet is in position," the tech beside her (Bao-Dur, was it?) stated in his usual manner - a gentle tone that was  _deceptively_  impassive.

 _Order me to activate the mass shadow generator_ , were the thoughts that rippled on the surface of his mind,  _tell me, and let me destroy them. I want every single one of them to burn._

The  _Aegis_  now bucked and rumbled with the impact of ordnance against their shields - symptoms of a battle that had now caught up with them. Venetia knew their time was limited. 

She squared her shoulders and cleared her throat. "Sylva, call back our ships. I don't want them too close to Malachor's orbit. They're outside the Shadow Generator's killzone, but the further they are from Malachor the better."

"Belay that, Master Jedi." The Commodore was furiously tapping away on the command consoles surrounding them. "The Mandalorians will tear us apart. We need to activate that weapon first, and  _now_!"

" _No_. We have to try," Venetia insisted, infusing her words with a touch of calmness. They all needed it. "I don't want to risk losing more good soldiers."

Genocide - that was what she was about to inflict on the Mandalorians. If she was committing mass murder, then she would damned well ensure that they were minimised. As a  _Jedi_ , that was  _expected_  of her. 

The Mon Cal stopped tapping, then met Venetia's gaze slowly. She held it for a moment before looking away. "Apologies, Master Jedi," the Commodore shook her head sadly. "They won't make it if we give the order to pull back."

 _I don't like gambling the lives of my soldiers any more than you do,_  the Commodore seemed to say,  _but it's a chance we have to take._

 _Do we, indeed?_  Venetia wondered, as muffled  _thumps_  rocked the bridge. Distant klaxons wailed, before reports of a hull breach in the lower levels played over the bridge's comm system. 

"General?" Bao-Dur prompted, but it went unacknowledged. 

Venetia felt as if she'd been thrust into a glass bottle - she saw the flashes of colour and movement all around her, but without the corresponding sounds to make them  _alive_. 

More clearly, she hadn't realised the extent of her weariness until this instant - it felt as if she was a single strand away from snapping completely.

She didn't want to decide between saving the Republic or the lives of many good soldiers. She just wanted to return to Dantooine - away from the deaths, the destruction, the  _senselessness_  of it all. The war had put her through an emotional meat grinder, leaving her craving for the uncomplicated serenity of Dantooine's grasslands.

She just wanted everything to end.

At that, the bottle shattered, burying her under an avalanche of sensory stimulation.

The Commodore had resumed her duties that Venetia had interrupted; redirecting turbolaser fire, reworking stratagems, and reassuring the battlegroup she commanded all at once. The Mon Cal officer had shut herself off to anything else, and she would be of no help to Venetia. Clearly, the captain of the  _Aegis_  was deferring to her judgement on the Mass Shadow Generator, in accordance to military hierarchy. Venetia resented that.

But the displays were still blinking, and the klaxons were still blaring. 

She turned to the Iridonian beside her and matched his gaze. She allowed it linger for the longest of moments, trying to convey the magnitude of what she wanted him to do - of what she was about to  _condemn_  him to, in those precious seconds. 

The  _Aegis_  bucked violently again, sending both of them fumbling around for handholds to steady themselves, but not once did they break eye-contact. With her mind made up, Venetia steeled herself for the inevitable with a silent prayer.

_Forgive us all._

She nodded.

\- - -

Nothing seemed to happen in the terse seconds after. 

Damage reports filtered in in an endless stream no different than before, and so had the status reports across the different fleets. Nor had the view outside the transparisteel windows changed: it was still a deadly crossfire of lasers and explosions separating the two sides.

Anticipation lingered in the bridge like a charge in the air, the buzz of activity reduced to bated breath and the gentle burr of electronics. It was quiet enough to hear a pin drop.

Almost immediately, the silence was shattered with military efficiency. "Commodore, General," the Operations Officer said, his attention still focused on his console. "Mandalorian ships are being dragged towards Malachor, as intended."

With a few keystrokes, his console's display was projected before the raised command platform. 

True to his word, the red blips of Mandalorian ships were being pulled towards the grayish ball of Malachor V. Seeing how those red blips collided with each other along the way left Venetia feeling vaguely -  _viciously_  - satisfied, an  _un_ -Jedi-like feeling that she quashed quickly. 

The Commodore leant against the command console with her head perched on her hands, her relieved sigh drowned out by the optimistic chatter in the bridge. "See? Nothing to worry about, Master Jedi."

The prickling at the base of Venetia's spine had yet to stop - rather, it was spreading upwards, prodding and poking her back like an unwanted blade. She searched the data feeds on the command console screens for anomalies, but they reflected the situation of the battle as seen through the bridge's viewports - of Mandalorian ships hurtling towards Malachor's surface with Republic forces in close pursuit, presumably intent on destroying the former. 

"No," Venetia swallowed the lump in her throat, Force sense clouded by doubt. "Something's wrong, Sylva. Something is very,  _very_  wrong."

Venetia scanned the ships beyond the windows, eyes darting from ship to ship, watching Mandalorian and Republic cruisers alike float closer towards Malachor's orbit.

Then, her breath caught in her throat. 

"What in the blazes?" Commodore Sylva was suddenly shouting, her strident tone overpowering the dull buzzing in Venetia's ears. "Battlegroup Alpha,  _pull back_. I repeat, all ships  _pull back_! " 

There was uproar in the bridge, the level-headedness from before dashed in an instant once the bridge crew caught on - but had she sensed it through the Force, or her mundane senses?

Everything else faded into the background as Venetia's awareness tunnelled to the battle beyond the viewports. She stood transfixed, watching in horrified silence as Republic ships were reeled in by the hyper-charged pull of Malachor, ramming indiscriminately against both Mandalorian and Republic ships in a shower of explosions. Hulking masses, debris, flashes of fire; a part of her marvelled at the jagged lines and splashes of colour cast against the dark canvas of space like a work of art, but that was a part of her that drowned in the despair that had slithered up her throat. 

_I should've known. There's no saving grace for the sinners, and I'm responsible for this mess._

Venetia's hands twitched in warning, and she looked to her right just in time to watch -  _all too clearly_  - the normally unflappable Commodore slam both fists on the command console, bulbous eyes pinched shut in frustration.

"No!"  _This wasn't supposed to happen._  Panicked, Venetia spun to face the Iridonian, a plea on her lips. "Can you deactivate the gravity well? It's dragging our forces along!" she spluttered, but he remained stock-still, eyes dilated in shock. "Lieutenant,  _answer_  me!" 

There was a dull pounding in her skull, interspersed with moments of sharp pain, but her mind was too steeped in pandemonium to take notice.

" _Bao-Dur!_ " Venetia shook his shoulder, but the technician didn't respond. At a loss, Venetia followed his gaze out of the viewports, only to have the blood freeze in her veins. 

Venetia had expected the destruction of ships, crushed completely to its atoms - such was the nature of gravity weapons. Planets were supposed to be untouchable by such forms of destruction, but that wasn't what she saw: black lines cutting swathes through mossy landmasses, the ships hurtling towards its surface chipping away at the planet like a vibrochisel, and gradually, Malachor crumbled.

It was a planet known for the grassy plains and lush vegetation that covered large tracks of its surface, but that was the point: it  _was_. 

"General, it is useless." Bao-Dur had finally found his voice, but it came out hoarser than before. "Malachor's gravitational anomalies amplified the Shadow Generator's capabilities. I warned Revan this might happen."

"No," Venetia was shaking her head furiously, unable to control the quaver in her voice. "An oversight by  _Revan_? I don't be-"

Razor-sharp pain sliced across her gut, and her head rocked with the sudden trauma of an invisible hammer. Why did it hurt to  _feel_?

Was she screaming? Someone- _something_  was making a noise so inhumane she wanted nothing more to tear her ears off, if only to stop the shrieking. 

"General?"

"-believe it," Venetia said raggedly. Vocalising her suspicions drained her, but that wouldn't stop her, and neither would the pain. "Revan had to know. And th-" A groan escaped her lips, and she dug her fingers into her temples until both ached "-they still approved...  _approved_  it."

Pain. Pain.  _Pain._  Just like nails scraping against plasteel, agonisingly slow and  _shrill_  in her ears, and maybe they were slicing out parts of her flesh too. Maybe someone had deigned to drop frag mines in her skull too - something was definitely shredding and slicing things in her brain, and it  _hurt_. 

The Force was elusive, shying away from her frantic touch, and pain lanced through her head. 

The torment gave way to a brief period of acute awareness, and to her horror, the  _Force_  itself was screaming.

She felt herself falling, legs giving way completely, and her joints ached from the impact. Her death grip on her head was the only thing left grounding her to the  _now_ , and not the gaping maw of pain that called her name, but her grip on reality was weakening, the pain short-firing her nerve-endings. 

"Master Jedi!"

In her ears, the screeching had given way to an inexplicable buzzing, something infinitely more harrowing but her brain was to wracked with throbbing to compute. 

Despite the smothering haze of anguish, it granted Venetia clarity, and nothing could convince her otherwise: she was dying. 

Her vision was spotty, the harsh fluorescent lighting of the bridge pockmarked by black patches and blurry faces. But through it all, she strained to find kind eyes and a crown of head horns - and when she did, her hands scrabbled for purchase on his green coveralls.

Bao-Dur's eyes widened imperceptibly as she tugged herself closer to him through sheer force of will. "Revan  _willingly_  risked our largest fleet," Venetia hissed through gritted teeth, the pain tightening her grip on the fabric. "I want to know  _why_." 

Then, she let go - too tired to keep her eyes open, too weak to cling on to the Iridonian, too weary to hold on to wakefulness when the alternative was far more alluring. 

Vaguely, some part of her snapped like a twig under a boot, causing the hurt to vanish in an instant - but the nothingness swirled around her like an ocean after without respite, devouring her like a ravenous boma beast.

Once the void dragged her down below, she knew no more.

\- - -

_She needs the infirmary._

Floating.

She was floating across a great expanse of space, weightlessly and peacefully. No fears, no worries: just her and the comforting emptiness.

She quite liked it here.

_I can carry her. She still breathes._

Who was she?

A pause.

Venetia Olic. Jedi, General, soldier. It was ludicrous that she struggled to remember that.

A saviour of the downtrodden, a champion for the wronged - part of an order tasked to defend whatever that was good in the galaxy. That was her duty, the meaning behind her fancy titles.

She was supposed to be a hero.

_Hurry. They've already been told to expect another one._

Hero? The word brought a foul taste to her tongue. She was no hero.

She'd nodded once, and the world as she knew it crashed and burned all around her.

She did what she felt was right, but what was there to show? Corpses, rubble and a lot more things that could never be fixed - an _excellent_ set of results to present to the Jedi Council on their return, surely.

_Lay her down here. It's the best I could make on such short notice._

Casualties were inevitable in war - to expect anything less was to be woefully naive. Three years of _hell_ had systematically smashed whatever grandiose notions she used to hold, and Revan had aptly summarised it.

You can't save everyone, they'd said.

But where were they supposed to draw the line?

_Will she be alright?_

Ironic, really. She came here to forget, but look at how well that turned out.

So she willed her mind to ease into restful slumber, and sleep quickly reached out for her. It was just how this strange place worked, and she wasn't complaining.

_I don't know, sonny. I don't know._

\- - -

_Click, whirr, beep._

This time, Venetia knew she was conscious, because the sensation of floating was conspicuously absent. Softness cushioned her body, and a thin material covered her chest down to the ends of her feet. 

Belatedly, she realised that someone had taken off her robes and boots, leaving her clad in her Republic-issue singlet and shorts. No wonder the chill was starting to seep into her extremities. 

_Click, whirr, beep._

She knew she was lying on a bed in the infirmary. She would recognise the hum of medical machinery anywhere. Still, she never liked infirmaries. Too sterile, too clean, too  _dead_.

That probably explained why infirmaries tended to be too silent.

_Click, whirr, beep._

Why was it quiet? Before she collapsed, hadn't she been...

The full weight of a recent space battle hit her like a speeder, and she jerked wide awake.

Webbed hands rested on Venetia's chest, gently pushing her back to the bed. "Master Jedi, hold still.  _Relax_."

"Sylva," Venetia croaked. She pushed away the Mon Cal's hands as she sat up, the blanket pooling around her lap. "The battle. Malachor. What happened? Are we-"

" _Slow down_ , Master Jedi." From her seat by the bed, Sylva inched closer to Venetia. "I admire your dedication, but you should be resting. Kranic still hasn't figured out what happened to you on the bridge, and he says the more you rest the better."

Sylva waggled a reprimanding finger close to Venetia's face. "And I wholeheartedly agree."

Seeing no way of dissuading the Commodore from that course of action, Venetia reluctantly sank back on her bed, making the mattress squeal in protest. The Mon Cal offered her a cup of water from the side table, and Venetia accepted it with a feeble  _thanks._

Venetia's mind swirled with a multitude of questions as she sipped from the cup, but she was careful to economise her movements. An assortment of wires and medical patches on her arms hooked her up to various medical monitors, not forgetting the customary IV drip, and she had no intention of tugging any of them loose. 

While Venetia watched the green symbols blinking on those displays, she was struck with a sudden thought: had she really given everyone else such a scare? Not once had she seen someone more closely monitored by medical equipment like she currently was in her all her twenty-six years. 

She carefully set the empty cup back on the table, her throat less of a desert than before. Then, she proceeded to sit up against the bed's headboard. 

"Since I'm stuck here," Venetia began, taking care not to cast her gaze around the room, "Can you tell me?"

Venetia didn't need, nor want to put a face to the muffled whimpering and stifled groans on the fringes of her hearing. 

"When you say it with such earnestness, how can I refuse?" Sylva shut her eyes in laughter, her Mon Cal accent changing it into a warble. "Besides, knowing you, I would've been disappointed if you didn't ask."

Sylva's expression changed quickly, gaining countless years in an instant as the grin morphed into a frown.

The Commodore's head dipped, eyes moving to stare at her interlocked hands. "What's there so say? The gravity weapon worked, perhaps a bit too perfectly." 

Venetia  _heard_  the heaviness in the Commodore's words rather than  _felt_  it, but that fact slipped her mind. She continued kicking the blanket off her feet.

"By the time you collapsed, most of the Mandalorian ships were either space dust or embedded on Malachor's surface. Those who survived the Shadow Generator surrendered. Now, we're safely in hyperspace, a week away from Coruscant."

Venetia knew full well what the Commodore omitted.  _Because we've lost too many ships to be operationally ready for further action._

The chill in the medbay was pricking Venetia's skin, even through the fabric of her clothes. "What about Revan?" she added, throat tight with emotion.

Part of her wanted to believe that her friend had overlooked the destructive capabilities of the Mass Shadow Generator. Part of her also knew that Revan would willingly sacrifice  _everyone_  if it meant achieving a strategic victory.

The rest of her knew that most of the Republic forces over Malachor were  _hers._

"Off to hunt down the remnants of the Mandalorian fleet." Sylva met Venetia's gaze head-on. "Just because they surrendered over Malachor doesn't meant that their scattered remnants across the galaxy would do the same."

_A week ago, you asked them if the Shadow Generator could malfunction, perhaps by pulling in ships outside of Malachor's gravitational field. They said no - with a straight face. Laughed at your paranoia, even._

_Then, they asked you to trust them, and you did._

"So Revan says," Venetia murmured. She hugged her legs to her chest, holding herself close while her insides shattered into a thousand, tiny pieces.

She didn't feel like discussing the battle anymore. 

Politely, Venetia told the Commodore she could leave and get on with her duties, but the Mon Cal waved off her concern and brandished a datapad. Even commanders needed to take a break sometimes, Sylva said.

They lapsed into silence, and Venetia was reminded once again of the quirkiness of her friendship with the Commodore. They'd known each other for only a couple of months, yet it seemed like they'd known each other for longer. 

Deep down, Venetia was glad the Commodore was still alive.

Watching the Commodore play a game of grav-ball on a datapad, Venetia was left confused - how had she inspired such loyalty in others when she was just some aloof Jedi? She was  _nothing_  like the charismatic Revanchist who held the Republic in rapt admiration. But everywhere she went, people kept sticking close to her, and that was a touch unsettling. 

 _Bah. Best not to dwell._  She nestled her head on her knees.  _It's nice having them around, anyway._

Moments later, she sat cross-legged in a meditative posture and clasped her hands in her lap. Closing her eyes, she inhaled deeply, letting the air fill every inch of her lungs in a calming wave. 

One thing held her back from beginning her meditations: her surroundings were already quiet to begin with, and Venetia found that odd for a warship crewed by thousands. 

Her eyes stayed shut. "Sylva, don't you find it a bit too quiet?"

"Quiet? The bucketheads battered us during the battle, but we weren't  _that_ banged-up." There was the non-stop clicking of buttons, ceasing only when the Commodore spoke again. "The ship's humming like it should be."

Of course Venetia could feel the ship hum. She wasn't that banged-up too. She just couldn't feel...

Venetia stretched out through the Force, but nothing. She couldn't. It was as if she was walled in on all sides, cut off from the greater fabric of the Force. 

She tried extending herself beyond those walls, imagining herself breaking out of a box, but the barriers stayed up. So she tried, again. 

Again. And again, and again, again, and again - the thumping in her chest rising to a frenzied crescendo with each failure as she tripped up on something so  _fundamental_.

For the love of everything holy, she was supposed to be a Jedi  _Knight_. Tapping on the Force should be instinctive to her by now.

" _Venetia!_  Snap out of it, will you?"

Someone was shouting in her ears, but Venetia saw a webbed hand cover her hands first. Everything else came crashing down after: the high-pitched whine of a heart-rate monitor, the Commodore's worried expression, harried medical officers crowding around her bed. 

But they were irrelevant observations filtering in through her mundane senses, especially when her mind was cognisant of one, and  _only_  one conclusion burned deep in her mind. 

"I can't feel the Force," Venetia said haltingly, wishing oh-so-desperately that it wasn't true.

But the inadequacy in her soul was there, being nowhere and everywhere all at once. No kind of healing - Jedi or otherwise - could bring back to life something that no longer existed. 

For the first time in her life, her eyes stung with the bitter tears of helplessness.

* * *

 

_all our light that shines strong_   
_[only lasts for so long](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cr0pqtyM8m0) _

**Author's Note:**

> Story-wise, I've always preferred HK-47's 'cleaning house' explanation for this battle, but I guess that's obvious already.


End file.
